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“If it looks like a duck…” – why humans need to focus on different approaches than insects if we are to become efficiently and effectively ultrasocial

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 June 2016

Kenneth John Aitken
Kenneth John Aitken*
Affiliation:
Learning Disability–Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service (LD-CAMHS), Greater Glasgow Health Board, Yorkhill Hospital, Glasgow G9 8SJ, United Kingdom. drken.aitken@btinternet.com
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Abstract

The parallels between the agricultural successes of ultrasocial insects and those of humans are interesting and potentially important. There are a number of important caveats, however, including the relative complexities of insect reproduction, their more rigidly determined altricial patterns of social behaviour, the roles of post-reproductive group members, and differences in the known factors involved in ultrasocietal collapse.

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Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 39 , 2016 , e94
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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